WOKING is the place to be for women determined to set up their own businesses.

A report on women executives by research firm Gavurin highlighted the town as a successful place for women to be in business. More than 100 new companies with all-female directors were established last year and 1,689 directors currently live in the town.

The results have been given the nod of approval by Business Link, which has spent the past two years supporting women who want to start their own business.

Business Link’s economic assessment officer Ros Mayer is pleased the work seems to be paying off.

Her organisation has focused on seminars designed to help women with their confidence as well as finance, IT and networking, as these are the areas women can struggle with.

Ms Mayer said: “If we put out a networking event, there is an excellent response and it shows there is a market in Woking.

“I have looked back through thousands of feedback forms and the main comments are that it helps them with their confidence and it is informative and helps them on to that next step.

“We get quite a variety of business setting up, ranging from consulting to health and beauty and retail.”

Business Link also holds women-only networking events, including the 12.30 Club.

Ms Mayer added: “Women feel comfortable to start with in this situation and then they will go on to different events.

“Business is business, whether you are male or female, and it falls on the individual’s own merits, but these events are a start.”

One woman who started life as a university lecturer before moving into IT in the private sector finally decided to turn her passion into a business.

Elly Munro set up Vin Biz, a wine tasting company, almost four years ago.

While her two partners are men, she is the main drive of the company.

She said: “We felt there had to be more of a choice in wine because supermarkets have to stick with a proven sales record so the smaller suppliers lose out.

“It was my drive to do something I had a passion for and a realisation there was a gap in the market.”

She has found Woking to be full of opportunities for businesses and said Woking Chamber was largely responsible for this.

She added: “There are a growing number of women in this area choosing to run their own business.

“We have got to the stage where women are expected to work and they believe, sometimes naïvely, that running their own business will give them more flexibility.

“Woking, as a whole, has a fantastic business community and we support each other.

“Therefore an idea gets into practice quicker because of that support and we get the confidence to say ‘give it a go’.”

Dr Munro believed support was the key for setting up a company, not only from the surrounding business community but from their friends and family.

She said: “They used to say that behind every good man there was a good woman but times are changing and equality is happening so now the men are supporting us. I couldn’t have done it without my husband.

“When you have an idea, you get obsessive about it, to the cost of everything else and regardless of whether you are male or female, you need someone behind you to pick up the rest of your life that you are forgetting.

“If there hadn’t been a woman behind the male inventors making sure they had eaten, would they have done so well?”

Dr Munro’s biggest piece of advice to women setting up is to remember, it is business not personal.

She added: “Women have a tendency to take things personally but I would say treat it as a learning curve and hold your head up high.”